Algonquin’s Cucina Bella celebrates 20 years of serving up Italian family recipes

For the past two decades, Cucina Bella has been bringing a piece of Italy to downtown Algonquin. On Thursday, the restaurant celebrated its 20th birthday.

Owner Tony Colatorti opened the downtown Algonquin Italian restaurant on July 24, 2005. He originally operated the Luke’s Italian Beef locations in the area before he decided to open a full-service restaurant.

“I’ve always loved Algonquin,” he said. “So when I saw the corner store had gone out of business and closed up, I peeked in the window and I saw the brick, and I was like, ‘All right, this is it.’”

To celebrate the 20-year milestone, Cucina Bella, at 220 S. Main St., has been offering specials and discounts all week, Colatorti said.

Many of the menu items come from family recipes. Colatorti is a first-generation American who is inspired by his mother’s and grandmother’s cooking from Bari, Italy.

One of Colatorti’s favorite items is the Suprema sauce, which was created by mistake. He and his team were preparing Alfredo sauce when some marinara accidentally got mixed into the batch.

Now the Suprema is one of the restaurant’s best sellers, Colatorti said.

“I think it’s the best sauce,” he said. “Lots of people try to duplicate it. Without the exact marinara ratio, it’s hard to do.”

Not much has changed at the restaurant over the years, except for an expansion of the space and an added outdoor patio.

Cucina Bella has developed a strong, loyal customer base, with people coming from all over the surrounding areas, some as far as Arlington Heights and Naperville, Colatorti said.

The lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic were a challenge, but not the biggest one the restaurant has faced in the last 20 years. Colatorti said he found the Great Recession in 2008 to be much more difficult.

“We opened up in 2005, and in 2007 we started seeing a slowdown,” he said. “By 2008, it was like the bottom fell out.”

Colatorti also owns Bella’s Wood Fire Pizza, which opened in 2023 across the street from Cucina Bella in downtown Algonquin. Another Cucina Bella location opened in 2024 in Galena. Colatorti may open another restaurant in Galena in the future, but right now he’s happy with what’s on his plate.

In the future, Colatorti hopes to pass the restaurant to his children, if they want to take it over.

“Hopefully, it can stay and be a staple in Algonquin for as long as possible,” he said.